Like many of my peers last Tuesday night, I sat on my couch, eyes glued on the television, ready to experience the election of the first female president. How could Hillary Clinton not win?
All the polls showed her leading nationally, Nate Silver’s FiveThirtyEight gave Clinton more than an 80 percent chance of winning, and Donald Trump had done everything possible to prevent his own election.
By the end of the night, I was humbled by my ignorance. Donald Trump, the architect of the most racially charged and divisive campaign in modern history, was elected the 45th president of the United States. While I remain saddened by what this election says about the culture of our nation, I am more dismayed by the post-election analysis of the mainstream media.
After every election, the losing party and political pundits perform a post-election autopsy. “Which demographic did we lose? What was the voter turnout? Which issues were most important to voters?” For the presidential election of 2016, the cause of death seems to be clear, Hillary Clinton lost “Middle America.” More specifically, she lost white, working-class America.
According to the talking heads on TV (I’m talking about you, Joe Scarborough), the solution is for progressive elites to leave their ivory towers and connect to these voters. The white working-class, undermined by globalization, technological progress and immigration, have suffered from unemployment, poverty and a loss of political power.
Confused and angry, these voters looked for answers, and Donald Trump was their solution. In the words of CNN political commentator Van Jones, this was a “whitelash.” Across the airwaves, pundits have called on Democrats to listen to the white working class’s pain and appease their concerns.
To them, I say, “impossible.”
Let me be clear, I am not advocating ignoring our fellow Americans; I am warning against the hindrance of progress for the sake of those who have held power for generations.
My first issue with this post-election analysis is that Democrats have somehow become the party of the “elites,” a death sentence in this political atmosphere. Voters don’t want a professor to lecture them, they want someone they can share a beer with.
It’s strange that the label of “intellectual” or “cultured” is undesirable in those who run our country. Why must Democrats apologize for having a larger demographic of college educated voters?
As a black man, to be called an elitist is not derogatory, but a sign of progress. I am too aware that almost 60 years ago, African Americans suffered from inadequate education in segregated schools, lacked the right to vote through racist laws and were treated like second-tier citizens.
Black men who dared to further educate themselves were deemed snooty, arrogant n*ggers. Not because they treated their white peers with disdain, but because they dared to move beyond the expectations that white America had already provided for them.
White people expect less of black people even today. If it is elitist to know the number of symphonies Beethoven wrote or to understand that jobs in the coal industry must be lost for the sake of a clean environment; I am an elitist. It’s a cop-out to call your political opponent an out-of-touch elitist. Instead, let’s actually debate the merits of a policy.
We “progressive elites” must point out that we have not ignored the cry of white America in the Midwest and the Rust Belt. For years, we’ve called for affordable healthcare, new infrastructure spending and job retraining that would directly benefit these people.
What is true is that for decades, middle and working class white-Americans had ignored the pain of their fellow Americans, all in the name of preserving their traditional values. They ignored the cries of African Americans as they pleaded for equal protection under the law. And once blacks won their right to vote, the Democrats lost a whole generation of whites in the South and the Midwest.
When the pandemic of HIV was plaguing the gay community, Middle America remained silent until the death rate became unbearable. Hispanic workers are being exploited and abused on farms all over this country, yet Middle America is silent until Hispanics organize and make their voices heard.
As working-class white America belittled their pain, these minority groups organized and educated themselves. Slowly but surely, progress was made. By 2016, an African American had become the president of the United States, marriage equality was a nationwide reality, and DREAMers had pushed for immigration reform. Middle America could no longer ignore them. America had changed, and white people no longer held the same disproportionate amount of power.
On Nov. 8, working class white America made their final stand. Working class whites voted for the candidate who called Mexicans rapists, threatened to punish women who chose to have abortions and promised to ban Muslims from entering the country.
This piece is not intended to bash those who voted for Trump but to galvanize those who understood that Trump does not represent the future of America.
I refuse to apologize for the progress this country has made in the face of bigotry, racism and sexism. I refuse to apologize that we “elites” thought that our country was no longer a bastion of angry white men willing to relinquish equality and diversity.
I also refuse to perpetuate the cycle of apathy and ignore the Americans who thought that voting for Trump was their only choice.
Progressives did not leave Middle America behind, Middle America’s aversion to change did. I pray that we can invite this part of the country to join us in this diverse new age and find commonality as citizens of this great nation.
Justin Thomas is a junior molecular and cellular biology major from Hamden, Conn.
